Pelosi Joins Calls For Gonzales Resignation

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has called on embattled Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to resign a day after his lackluster performance before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

"By his actions and with his testimony yesterday, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has lost the trust of the American people," the speaker said in a statement Friday afternoon.

Story Continued Below

"The nation cannot have a chief law enforcement officer whose candor and judgment are in serious question," Pelosi said. "The president should restore credibility to the office of the attorney general. Alberto Gonzales must resign."

Gonzales has been under fire over the dismissal of eight U.S. attorneys last year, with critics accusing him of being dishonest about the reasons for the sackings. He has denied any "improper reasons" were behind the firings.

He was subdued and deferential on Capitol Hill on Thursday, but it was clear at the end of seven hours before the Senate Judiciary Committee that he had not won over the panel, even enduring a stunning public demand for his resignation from a Republican senator.

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) was the third GOP senator to call for Gonzales to step down, telling him that it was the only way to restore public confidence in the Justice Department.

"The damage to the Justice Department, the attorney general's office and you personally has been significant," said Coburn, who added that Gonzales' handling of the matter "has been terrible."

"I believe the best way to put this behind us is your resignation," said Coburn, who joined Republican Sens. John Sununu of New Hampshire and Gordon Smith of Oregon in openly urging Gonzales to step down from the post that he's held for the last two years.

Other Republicans were equally harsh.

Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the committee's ranking member, told Gonzales that his "credibility has been significantly impaired because of the panorama of responses you have made" over the last few months to questions about why the firings occurred and about his involvement in the process of selecting the prosecutors who would be replaced.

Specter also referred to "morale problems" at the Justice Department due to the public uproar that has engulfed Gonzales and other senior officials there, but he refrained from calling for him to step down.

Democrats were equally fierce in their treatment of Gonzales, with Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) asserting the scandal was as serious as any he's seen since coming to Washington more than three decades ago.

"Today, the Department of Justice is experiencing a crisis of leadership perhaps unrivaled during its 137-year history," Leahy said in his opening statement. "The truth is that these firings have yet to be explained, and there is mounting evidence of improper considerations and actions resulting in the dismissals."

Gonzales, who publicly apologized to the fired prosecutors, said repeatedly that he could not remember any details of a critical Nov. 27 meeting at the Justice Department, where the plan to oust several federal prosecutors was discussed by senior department officials, or an Oct. 11 meeting to discuss voter fraud allegations with the president and his top political adviser, Karl Rove.

Gonzales did concede "mistakes" in the Justice Department's handling of the firings and his public response to questions about them, though he stuck by the decision to sack the prosecutors.